Fangirl mode, engage!

Recently I had the opportunity to fulfill a fangirl fantasy- I got to meet and have dinner with Ted King! Ted King is one of my favorite American cyclists for a variety of reasons- he’s funny, he has an awesome blog, he rides for one of my favorite teams (Liquigas-Cannondale), he’s cute, he’s tall… lots of very legitimate reasons make him my favorite, clearly. A Twitter friend alerted me to a dinner that was being put on by a LBS in Virginia. For a fee, you could have dinner with Ted King! Even though the dinner started later than I would’ve liked and was all the way in Virginia, I knew I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t go! A couple of days before the event, I found out the Joe Dombrowski was also going to be there (he’s a young American rider who just got signed for a major pro cycling team, Team Sky).

I was actually really nervous- I don’t do well around strangers. It’s not that I’m awkward, it’s that introducing myself to strangers and making small talk with them is a bit stressful for me and wears me out. I prefer to avoid it! I was the first to get there and luckily my other Twitter friend Steph was the second one there. In the end, there were only about 13 people- it made for a really nice night! When I finally got to talk to him, I thought I was very charming 😉 We talked about RAGBRAI and I think I convinced him to ride it once he retired! Hey Ted, if you ever need a RAGBRAI team to join, I’m sure I can find one for you to join!

When following these guys as professional cyclists, it’s easy to forget that they’re actually just ordinary people. Like any celebrity, they get built up in your mind and seem larger than life. If you ever get a chance to meet someone you look up to, it brings them back down to earth. Some people do get changed by fame, but many stay pretty much the same. Sometimes it wasn’t until he say something about Liquigas or a big race or a teammate that I’d be reminded that he was part of the world I only read about! After dinner, there was a question and answer session with Joe and Ted. People asked a lot of questions to Joe about his move to Sky and his time on Livestrong-Bontreger. It made me realize that being an armchair fan is a lot different than actually being in the races, doing all the work. He talked a lot about how awesome it was to get invited to Tour of California and Utah. And I thought, wow, all we thought about when we heard that news was how there must be something dodgy going on for that team to get invited over some of the domestic teams. But for Joe, he has no idea (nor does he probably care) about why they might get invited to races- he’s just excited at the chance. And who’s to say that Joe would’ve gotten picked up by Sky if he hadn’t been at those races, holding his own against the big boys. The best thing to come out of the evening was just a reminder that most of these guys we follow and maybe even look up to, are just regular guys- you’ve got jerks, shy guys, funny guys, and super nice guys. So just like real life, we shouldn’t expect them all to be someone we could be best friends with (or boyfriends. Just sayin’).